Tips For Being Stress Free For Overwhelmed Mom

The picture on your right side is my 3 years and 4 months old daughter. She is very smart and energetic. I wonder how she gets all the energy. From the time she wakes up until time to bed, she always has something to do. After baths and breakfast she usually playing around with her toys, with everything she found in the house, go outside and inside the house for times, singing (almost all day long), playing with other toddlers in our neighborhood, collecting stones and grasshoppers (she dares to grab a grasshopper), tearing papers, coloring, drawing, start learning alphabeths and number, coloring her nails with crayon, playing with her lunch or dinner, sometime crying, and many many more until her time to bed at 7 pm ..sigh. As a stay at home mom, I should not be overwhelmed but sometime I just got it. I just have one child and many moms in my society have more than I and it's not common in my society to admit that you've got overwhelmed. But I learn that it's okay to feel overwhelmed sometimes, it makes you think and learn how to get out from this situation.

I wonder if all the overwhelmed thing is related to the baby blues syndrome ? Is it possible that a mom who had baby blues syndrome or postpartum distress and not get over it will sometime being overwhelmed ? But I learn that feeling overwhelmed could happen to anybody. Men and women in different range of ages. With tight schedules and many things to achieve you may sometime get overwhelmed. So, I think baby blues is not the main reason. In my society (Indonesian people) is not common to admit if you got a baby blues syndrome. They will think that you're a spoiled woman :) I'm serious..They will say, "I got 3, or 5.or 10 children and I'm fine. You just spoiled," It is the obligation of woman to deliver the baby and taking care of it. That's the common thing in my society. So, if there is a woman that after gave birth of a baby and suddenly feel sad and unhappy they just don't get it. But actually the baby blues syndrome is a normal feeling of a woman after giving birth a baby. And I learned that the feeling was last only for first couple of weeks after I gave birth of my baby and never feel about it anymore.

Another thing that may caused mom for being overwhelmed is I think that usually mom intend to be "the perfect mom". Compete with other mom and be the perfect one :)

Being unemployed or jobless.

Many reasons, from the number of children you've got, the bad relationship, many troubled children, taking care of disable person in the family (like parents or spouse), hectic works, natural disaster (flood, earthquake, tsunami), etc

1. Give yourself (mom) a present : Time for yourself.
About 15 to 30 minutes before your child wake up give yourself time to relax and get prepared for the day. Enjoy a cup of tea or coffee for yourself and read the morning news on newspaper, or listening your favorit music in your Ipod would give you a better feeling.
After your child go to bed in the night, give yourself a treat. Doesn't have to be fancy like manicure or spa just a soothe warm water bath with few drops of essential oil that have relaxing scent like lavender or jasmine would be nice and comfortable.

2. Praying or meditating.
If you have a praying or meditating habit whatever your religion is you would feel more relief. Take time to pray, in the morning or night before you go to bed. Pray before you deal with your daily schedule.

3. It's okay to be not so perfect mom.
Make a priority of what you are going to do today. Decide what will you choose between clean up or play with your child. Concentrate only what you're doing in front of you. If playing with your child is your priority then let the whole of you be with that child. After that, you could move to another task. You don't have to do all those tasks in a perfect way just do your best.

4. Ask help from your spouse or partner.
Nowadays husbands tend to be more supported than year of my mother. My husband did the laundry until my baby is six months old every morning before go to work and took the baby in the evening to give me a moment time to relax. These simple helps are what mom really need.

5. Make a what to do lists.
If you are mom that has job outside the house, you may have to rearrange your schedule.You could make a list about all appointments and tasks for today. If you have someone to take care of your baby don't forget to store all your breast milk in plastic bottles and ask her to give it to the baby every 3 or 4 hours and bring the breast pump in your office, so that you could pump it and give it to the baby right after you get home. Call your baby sitter at noon to check the baby but don't do that so often it could make you stress. Check your lists and do what you can do next, like meet the client and shop for the grocery after work,etc.

6. Make a simple dinner and lunch.
You don't have to make feasts every day. Make a simple and healthy one. Or if possible make a stack of dinner and keep it in tupperware containers store it in refrigerator. You just need to reheat the meal. I made a simple fried rice for dinner and mix all the leftover like vegetables, egg, and meatballs in the early months after gave birth of her. Drink plenty of water and take vitamines and supplement. Eat more fruits and vegetables, those will help your health condition and plenty of breast milk. If you have plenty of breast milk, the baby will satisfy and sleep easily. That was from my experience.

7. Watching funny movies
If you feel overwhelmed, one fast way to feel more relax is watching funny movies. Rent movies like Rush Hour, Ace Ventura or Bad Boys are great to relief stress.

8. Be thankful and try to enjoy everything you do.
If you have to do the laundry, just think of people out there who doesn't have the laundrymat or the dryer machine. There are people in my country that still wash their laundry in the river. Thankful for the dryer machine is a great reason to feel stress free :)